Non-linear video editing (e.g. for film and television post production) is a well known video editing method that is often referred to as desktop editing, since it is considered to be the audio/video equivalent of word processing. At the heart of non-linear editing is the ability to access any frame in a digital video clip with the same ease as any other.
Generally, in non-linear editing applications, the original video and/or audio source files are not lost or modified during editing. Rather, decisions made by the video editor are recorded by software in an edit decision list. This makes for very flexible editing, since many versions of the original source files can exist without having to store multiple different copies of these files. It also makes it easy to change cuts and undo previous decisions, since this can be done by simply editing the edit decision list. Another advantage is that, with the edit decision lists, the video editor can work on low-resolution copies of the video. This makes it possible to edit both standard-definition broadcast quality and high-definition broadcast quality very quickly, even on normal personal computers (PCs) that would be unable to do the full processing of the huge full-quality high-resolution data in real-time.
Thus, a non-linear editing (NLE) or non-linear video editing (NLVE) system or application is a video and/or audio editing system that can perform random access on its source material and that allows a user to capture, edit, save and playback video and audio streams. In general, a non-linear editing application is a software application running on a computer system, such as a desktop or laptop computer. In some cases, a non-linear editing application receives the active video streams and audio streams through an Input/Output (I/O) system via a communication interface.
Many different NLE software applications exist and can be either purchased directly, included with an appropriate operating system, accessed free as web applications or downloaded free of charge. Examples include Avid Media Composer, Apple®'s Final Cut, Adobe Premiere, Microsoft®'s Windows® Movie Maker, Cinelerra, Blender3D and AVS Video Editor, among other possibilities.
Standard NLE applications support and are adapted to receive and process at least one active video stream and at least one audio stream, to be edited by a user. However, while these standard NLE applications are configured to process video and audio data, they do not support or process data that is both non-video and non-audio. Thus, any non-video, non-audio ancillary data associated with a video stream, such as for example closed-captioning information, payload identifiers, camera position information, time code information and metadata, is not supported by standard NLE applications.
Accordingly, in prior art approaches, the I/O system interfacing with such a standard NLE application is adapted to transfer in an appropriate format to the NLE for each frame of a video stream only the video portion and its associated audio tracks. All other types of ancillary data associated with the video stream, such as closed captioning information and metadata, are lost to the user of the NLE application (i.e. the editor) and can not be restored after editing of the video stream by the editor. Although it may be possible to recreate the lost ancillary data before playing back the edited video stream, this would be time consuming and have to be done through expensive, specialized hardware and software. For example, the editor would have to re-encode closed captioning information into the edited video stream using dedicated hardware and software before playback.
Consequently, there exists a need in the industry to provide an improved method and system for capturing ancillary data associated with a video stream, such that this ancillary data is not only not lost upon editing and/or playback of the video stream by a standard non-linear editing application, but can itself be edited and played back with the video stream.